A sharp focus on owning the guest relationship will drive stronger profits and set the stage for personalization

40% of brands said first-party digital ordering will drive the highest revenue growth in 2025, as they seek to remove third-party interference, own the guest relationship, and increase profitability.

Both QSRs and Fast Casuals ranked first-party online ordering as the top revenue growth opportunity.

After first-party ordering, QSRs prioritize drive-thru & third-party ordering; Fast Casuals focus on catering & on-premises ordering expansion.

Brands prioritize systems consolidation to drive efficiency and build a scalable foundation for future innovation

64% of enterprise restaurants look to upgrade to unified systems that centralize data and improve operating efficiencies and real-time reporting.

Across the board, unifying systems is the clear first step to ensuring efficient, profitable growth

Both QSRs and Fast Casuals are prioritizing technology consolidation first, as they continue modernization efforts to implement future-forward systems.

87% of brands say unifying payments is important.

Unifying payments is a must for achieving cost savings and getting to a single view of the guest.

The trend toward owning the guest relationship continues, with marketing & loyalty, mobile apps, and data leading the charge

CDP and data investments, up 11%, are poised to outpace loyalty investments, down 8% YoY. Data platforms take on new importance as loyalty has lost its way with a focus on the few–data can be its savior when the two are paired together. End goal: Make the digital channel conform to overall brand standards, improve the guest relationship and guest lifetime value.

Fast Casual focused on direct guest relationship; QSR investing in efficient transactional systems

It’s time for loyalty to broaden its horizons and capture the overall guest base

Investments in CDPs and CRMs are rising, to drive loyalty program effectiveness. Loyalty could be a loss leader if not combined with data-driven strategies that improve customer acquisition and capture a larger pool of guests.

Operators are implementing kiosks to drive efficiency and ease labor pressures.

62% of brands embrace kiosks to help alleviate labor challenges and drive operational efficiencies. In 2023, 43% of brands planned to add kiosks.

Kiosk growth at QSR brands significantly outpaces the fast-casual segment, with 80% of QSRs and 52% of Fast Casuals implementing kiosks in-store

Data insights show a trend towards divergence of digital strategies between QSR and Fast Casual brands, with QSRs seeing a kiosk-driven future; and Fast Casuals moving more quickly to direct guest relationship management.

Kiosks are widely deployed, but brands remain tentative on outcomes and ROI

The future for kiosks will require a more intentional focus on revenue generation with strong promise for higher Average Order Volumes (AOVs) than other channels due to upsell features.

Brands look to improve order accuracy, speed of service, and staff productivity

Nearly 70% of enterprise restaurants report that order accuracy is the biggest efficiency challenge, followed by speed of service and staff productivity.

Order accuracy: digital’s achilles’ heel

Order accuracy continues to dampen the delight of digital guests. Other challenges like employees turning off online orders and food quality point to the need for unified systems and data for driving kitchen efficiencies.

Digital and off-prem sales are stabilizing, with incremental growth in 2024.

The 3-year view of digital sales shows steady yet modest growth with a 4% increase since 2022. Incremental gains and a stable ordering mix means restaurants can finally focus on owning the direct guest relationship and improving unit level economics.

Fast casual digital adoption climbs

Fast Casual brands have stronger digital adoption with 1 in 10 brands reporting 50%+ digital sales. 57% of FCs and 23% of QSRs have 26%+ digital sales.